Wednesday, July 20, 2016

The denier logic at its finest: the famous Buchenwald photo.

Author: Sergey Romanov

Deniers wouldn't be deniers if they had a modicum of common sense.
Case in point, a guy who goes under the nickname "The Black Rabbit of Inlé".

His blog features a piece of "research" which he must be very proud of.
He discovered that the first time Pvt. H. Miller's famous photo of Buchenwald survivors on the camp bunks was published in The New York Times Magazine on 06.05.1945, the survivor standing near the wooden support was not there.

Note that this obviously was not the first publication of this photo ever. E.g. it was published in St. Louis Post-Dispatch on 29.04.45.

So, the Rabbit proved that the NYTM published a heavily retouched photo due to some editor's fit of prudishness. In the immortal words of Joe Biden, this is a BFD. Not.

The retoucher was so inept that he even forgot to draw the bottom part of a wooden bunk post when he deleted the standing man.

But being a Holocaust denier*, the Rabbit obviously thinks he uncovered something much more sinister, since his headline screams:

The Most Famous Holocaust Photo a Fraud

Um, sorry? All we see is evidence of a retouched photo in a magazine. Is there any evidence that the original photo has been manipulated in any way? There is none.

[* Note: since then the Rabbit has abandoned the hardcore denial.]

One only need to take a look at the hi-res version (originally from a DOD site) to see that there's no sign of tampering (aside from the photo serial number having been deleted). And if one supposes (without any proof) that the standing man was pasted into the negative somehow, it would certainly be the most impressive 1940s fake I've ever seen, what with the textured shadow

and the fine motion blur indicating (to all non-brain-damaged individuals) that the man slightly moved his upper body during the process:

Here is another instance of such motion blur on the photo:

The website WW2 Freak even replicated the effect (though here the whole figure is in motion, not only the upper body, so the effect strength is the same along the height of the figure):

The details that are quite superfluous (propaganda-wise) because of the graininess and generally not very high quality of the photo reproductions of that time. And yet these details are there. And the lighting fits. Everything fits. Outstanding! Too bad no one with a functioning brain would argue that such mastery would be wasted on pasting a man on a photo for a reason that cannot be discerned.

I mean, it's almost like one could have just asked the man himself, who in another photo in the series just sits around next to the bunk 27 (also seen on the previous photo), to stand up and pose instead of expending time and energy on such a high-quality photo manipulation, apparently just for fun. Or maybe just use one of the many other photos with similar depictions instead.

There's more: on the hi-res version we can see see that there was clearly someone else on the bunk behind the standing man's back:

Yet there is nothing to be seen on the bunks in the NYTM version.

The argument that it is easier to add something rather than delete something doesn't hold water in this case. It is not easy to add something without making it look out of place, especially when the hi-res versions are available for inspection. We've already seen how well the image holds up. Deleting something, knowing that only an extremely poor, grainy, low-res version (like the one that appeared in the NYTM, would be available for inspection doesn't present a problem. One only had to add a few lines representing the few planks/posts behind the man's back.

Unsurprisingly, many other denier idiots have swallowed the bait. One need only look at the comments below the Rabbit's post. Or google. Then one could find any number of rubes mindlessly parroting the claim, among them our old friend Carolyn Yeager, that notoriously stupid neo-Nazi, screeching about "dishonest photo-fakery" at the pathetic "Elie Wiesel Tattoo" site. Oh, and the moon-landing hoax shadows are making a comeback! ROFL.

On one thing I can agree with the Rabbit and the Goebbels in skirt: there is, indeed, fraud involved here. Just not in the photo.

PS: the Rabbit and the deniers repeating his bunk also used to bring up the doctored version of the photo on the cover of Mel Mermelstein's book. But the Rabbit has been forced to admit that the clearly visible gray smudge on the photo instead of the standing man means that the photo was retouched a second time for the use on the cover; it's not the same version as published in the NYTM.

Updated on 13.05.2017: reference to an earlier publication added.Updated on 04.06.2017 and 17.06.2017: further information added.Updated on 26.07.2017: pointed out the deletion of the serial number. Updated on 03.08.2017: added a few bits, including an argument from the bunks behind the man; pointed out by blake121666.

68 comments:

You know, if this charlatan had spent 1/100 as much time figuring out the facts about the Miedzyrzec photo (placed at Majdanek) as he did concocting false scenarios about the Buchenwald photo he'd have saved himself a lot of embarrassment. Thanks for this, Sergey.

I don't really see the logic of tampering with this photo. So what if the standing man was removed/placed? What's that supposed to prove? If the "powers that be" could fake this photo, why didn't they fake the Hitler order that deniers demand then?

Then again, BROI is the same idiot who insisted that the "dug outs" referred to mass graves, based on the most ridiculous twisting of the English language I've ever seen. So there.

This is actually the first thing I thought when I originially read this post on carolyn yeager's website. Even if the standing man or the placement of wiesel in the picture are a "fraud", than there are still around 20 people on the barracks in all versions of the picture. 20 people were de-humanized by the nazis insstead of the "alleged" 22 in this one cabin, surely the holocaust is fake all together!!!

I went back and read through that Rodoh thread which Rabbit linked to. My oh my, it seems that indeed the shoddy work on Rabbit's blog has previously been taken to task - and yet Rabbit doesn't even try proving his case here.

SR >>> Who cares, Rabbit. You've just been shown to be a clown. Enjoy.

Just a few hours ago I was reading the preview of James and Lance Morcan's anti-revisionist book and dwelling on the stark difference between the quality of their shoddy work compared to the anti-revisionist stuff usually published on this blog.

Then I read this post. Which is just as pathetic as something they'd produce. lmao

"Who cares" and name-calling, is the best you could offer when asked to address the fact your "hi-res version" is not an authentic reproduction and the fact bunk post appears in the Mermelstein version.

Please, the MM version doesn't make the posts miraculously appear in the NYTM version and different cropping doesn't mean that the photo is not original. You literally ignored most of what I wrote, brought up two irrelevant points and expect to be taken seriously while forgetting that the burden of proof was and still is on you (which was the main point of the posting).

I've not fucked up at all, as you well know Serg. The fact we don't know who precisely doctored the Buchenwald photo, doesn't changed the fact it's doctored, any more than it does for the Trotskyless photos."

>>>"the MM version doesn't make the posts miraculously appear in the NYTM"That goes without saying.

>>>"different cropping doesn't mean that the photo is not original"There's no such thing as an "original" photo print when discussing film photography, there's only the original negative from which authentic prints can be made. I've never seen a version of this photo that could be considered an authentic print; all versions can be shown to have been cropped by comparing them with each other. Who knows where the original negative is, your C&P from wikipedia: "hi-res version (originally from a DOD site)" suggests that they don't have it either, or if they do, they opted to make a print which they then cropped in precisely the same way as the version held at the NARA.

>>>>"You literally ignored most of what I wrote" That's because it's all been said before. You're in 'the NYT dun did it' group. You also have no evidence to support it. You just repeat the theory that some unknown sub-editor ordered one of his photo-doctoring experts—look how well s/he painted-in the bunks where Toncman should be—to drastically alter an official US Army photo. All done just to protect the alleged sensibilities of NYTM readers. Great theory, shame about the lack of evidence.

1. So it's irrelevant to the question of whether the NYTM photo is retouched.

2. That's some heavy nonsense there. While inept or malicious cropping can change the content of the image, since you are not making any claim about anything crucial having been cropped away, the cropping is simply irrelevant to the question of whether the image is original or not. Yes, a high-res image straight from "the horse's mouth" (the Army) is authentic until shown otherwise, the demonstrably retouched NYTM image is not. And the negative is held in NARA, as my other link indicates.

3. I don't know what has or has not been said before, deal with what I wrote, not anyone else. Namely: a) the burden of proof is on you and you have not met it, you have no evidence to support your claim; b) the photo is demonstrably retouched (posts) so that's already evidence to support it; c) there is no evidence from the authentic image itself that it's been retouched; d) your thesis not only is without evidence but also contradicts all common sense (as pointed out at length in the post) so it can be dismissed out of hand.

In light of all this the NYTM retouching is simply a "fact by default" until shown otherwise. But even if I wanted to play the magical balance fairy and take the agnostic position (that would be silly, but for the sake of the argument), and say that OK, neither side has proven their case, that would *still* mean that your positive claim of the photo being fraudulent is idiotic and you still have to post an update at your blog indicating as much before being taken seriously.

4. Well, if you, as a native English speaker, can't differentiate between another native speaker who writes pretty eloquent prose and a Russian whose English is OK but still pretty choppy at times, that's hardly comparable to Roberto allegedly making an identification mistake.

In any case, your claim that I was banned at AHF has the same truth value as your claim that S.R. is a pseudonym. Unfortunately, quite a lot of your claims have the same truth value...

- The cropping proves emphatically that of all publicly available versions of the photo, not a single one is an authentic reproduction from the original negative. This is not irrelevant, and your complaining won't alter that.

- The high-res image is not from "the Army", but was downloaded from the American Forces Network's presently defunct website. An archived copy of the webpage shows that they took it from a CD produced by the NARA:http://web.archive.org/web/20110516111940/http://www.dodmedia.osd.mil/DVIC_View/Still_Details.cfm?SDAN=HDSN9902764&JPGPath=/Assets/Still/1999/DoD/HD-SN-99-02764.JPGhttps://www.archives.gov/publications/multimedia/index.html

- All you've done research-wise in your efforts to debunk my post is go to Wikipedia and C&P the photo and a NARA link, and then make-up some BS about the high-res version originating from "the Army". Hilarious stuff! And you call me a clown!

- If the NARA does hold the "negative" as *your* link states, then perhaps you can explain why they don't feature it, or a print from it, on *your* link, instead of just featuring the heavily cropped print.

- I have provided the same amount of proof that Alain Jaubert, Dino Brugioni, and David King provided in their respective books on the manipulation of photographs, namely, different versions of photographs from published sources and archives.

- How can you be so sure your "missing post" is even missing? That part of the bunks was farther from the lighting source used by the photographer. It's more than likely that it's there and is just not visible in the NYTM's seven decade old, cheaply printed, 100mm x 76mm, non-high-res version of the photograph.

- You've still to address how the "inept" [your word] NYT airbrusher so expertly created the empty bunks where Simon Toncman is supposed to be.

- You can also explain wtf the NYT—if they were really so protective of readers' innocence—just didn't crop the photo like it did a week earlier [edition of April 29, 1945, p.20]

- There's plenty of evidence from the Toncman-present version that it's been doctored, including but not limited to the contrasting acutance of Toncman's left-arm against the post and the left-arm of another man also against a post [bottom row 3rd from left]. You claimed this was cause by Toncman moving his arm [just the left side of it?], but you made such an unconvincing case that you felt the need to insult anyone who might disagree: "the fine motion blur indicating (to all non-brain-damaged individuals) that the man slightly moved during the process:" Utterly pathetic. You also implied Toncman must have moved his head, but not his face, or maybe just his left ear; perhaps due to definition of the auricular muscles most of us lack.

- It is your theory that lacks sense: A motherly editor at the NYT arranged for an highly talented photo manipulator to paint bunks and flooring over Toncman—instead of just cropping him out as they had the previous week—as they were desperate to publish a tiny version of the photo in the back of their magazine, but they didn't want the hardly-shocking-sight of Toncman causing any of their readers to faint/die/complain/whatever! Then, 34 years later, by sheer coincidence, Mel Mermelstein did precisely the same thing, for similar reasons, so he could publish a *sanitised* version on the cover of his self-published memoirs. But kinda shot himself in the foot by publishing the Toncman-present version inside this book!

My theory on the other hand is perfectly logical: Staff in the Signal Corps Photographic Library and Laboratory (in the Pentagon) thought the photo of the men/boys on the bunks was particular iconic, but all those other empty bunks detracted from its power. Someone thought it would be worth using the expertise of the lab staff to cut-out some thin chap from another photo on the same roll of film, place him in-front of the empty bunks, then photo the composite and pass it off as an original. It worked a treat, and would still be fooling everyone 71 years later had it not been for a couple of original versions of the photo making their way out of the Pentagon by staff error.

- I don't know, or care to know, enough about you, wolfman, SM, or RM, to identify any of you just from prose on an internet forum. RM and I have in the past both made false calls on who an anon. person might be. Big deal!

As for SR being your actual name: Whatever. As for saying you had been banned from AHF: That was an honest mistake, I thought this Sergey from Moscow must have been you:http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=181467&p=1624020#p1624020

1. That this is mere motion blur is undeniable, since the same effect, in an even more clear form is present on a side of the man's head, esp. noticeable around the ear and the neck. So there is exactly zero evidence of doctoring. Your comment about face is hardly coherent.

2. That a prudish NYTM editor would order the photo to be retouched to delete a naked man in 1945 makes a lot of sense. While completely cutting him off might have made sense too, maybe the editor thought that would ruin the composition completely. Be that as it may, we *know* the photo was retouched (bunk posts). That anyone would doctor this photo to add the standing man (at all, and in this specific highly skilled way) makes no sense whatsoever, as is clearly explained in the article.

And having just now looked at MM's cover, I think you're hallucinating.

Not only the bottom part of the posts cannot be seen, almost the whole area is a grey smudge (unlike the NYTM version), which means that yes, whoever made the cover manipulated the photo anew (whether not to take away the focus from Mel, or because of nudity, or both).

3. Your "theory" makes exactly zero sense (as in, you don't manipulate already released photos; the "release by error" is a pathetic ad hoc; and the whole "recognizing an iconic photo" blah blah blah is just an absurd flight of fancy) and there is no evidence for it whatsoever. No evidence for a separate photo with the standing man, no evidence for a separate photo with the empty bunks (NYTM was retouched, doesn't count). And it's against the Occam's razor.

4. It's not a big deal, it just fits the pattern of you making idiotic half-assed claims which are against available evidence. Like you claiming that your crazy "theory" is completely logical.

- The cropping doesn't have anything to do with whether an image is an authentic reproduction from the original negative. Zero connection. So, irrelevant.

- That's even better then, the NARA has the original Army negatives.

- The only thing I need to debunk you is to point out the obvious fact that you haven't even begun making your case. I went far above and beyond that. So yeah, your "theory" is still absurd, out-of-hand dismissable and that makes you a clown.

- Once again, the cropping doesn't mean that the image doesn't come from the negative. They are not obligated to do it on your terms. Nobody is.

- You haven't provided any proof that the original photo has been manipulated in any way. All you've found are two demonstrably retouched photos in secondary sources. Which means exactly nothing.

- Now you contradict yourself because above you falsely claimed that the missing post is visible on the MM photo. Your new excuse (contradicting your old excuse) is even more laughable. We see the *whole* post *except* for the part hid by the standing man. The lighting is the same along the post, so we should be able to see the bottom part just as we see the rest, but suddenly you want it to be drastically different at this particular point. Won't fly here.

"So what. Want me to post a link to RM incorrectly accusing another poster of being Juergen Graf on rodoh, seeing that such an error is enough to discredit someone forever in your book! LOL"

The difference is that the poster in question (was lurking in those days) had a very similar style to Graf, whereas anyone with a gram and a half of sense can tell that SM and SR are totally different people, with different backgrounds.

None of your foot stomping pants-shitting troll posts have made any impact on the facts hammered home by the original article btw.

This is what it would take to look at that picture and instead of seeing human suffering and wonder about how can man to that to one another , focus on an insignificant detail feature in the picture. I fail to see makes any difference in the despair and poor state that arises from that picture. One look at the eyes of those laying on those wooden planks is enough for anyone ( not choosing to be blind ) to tell you the whole story.

That is why it is called denial not revision.

Those deniers do not satisfy themselves with with questioning some aspect or numbers of the holocaust. They want to deny and rob survivors of all their history of human suffering and any human compassion that may arise from it.

The denial on this picture has the same odor as the denial of Anne Frank diary. Though deniers agree that Jews where sent to concentration camps they have a problem with Anne Frank because she is a face people can identify with sympathise with.

Deniers are not about negating this or that fact , they want to rob survivors of any human feeling.

- It's your poor understanding of the use of punctuation in the English language that resulted in your failure to comprehend my point about Toncman's face. I'll try to simplify it especially for you: If the ghostly marks around his head were really the result of motion blur, then his entire head—including his face—would be blurred; no one can move their head without moving their face. Это понятно? The same applies to the *blurs* that only appear on the left side of his left arm *only* where it covers the wooden post; his entire arm would be blurred if this was motion blur.

- LOL at your theory that painstakingly painting flooring and bunks over the offending Toncman on a US Army photo made *more* sense to the NYT than simply cropping off that part of the photo.

- Yes, you're right about the MM version, I posted that comment from my phone and wasn't looking at the correct bunk-post. But the evolution of your theory from the photo was doctored once [NYT] to it was doctored twice [NYT & MM] has been noted, and laughed at.

- Your 3 and 4 are just whining and are not worthy of a response.

- You wrote: "The cropping doesn't have anything to do with whether an image is an authentic reproduction from the original negative. Zero connection. So, irrelevant." You're quite wrong of course, perhaps due to not understanding what "an authentic reproduction" actually means. An uncropped print from the original negative would go a long way to settling this argument once and for all. Why don't you order one from the NARA if you think they really have the original negative of Miller's photograph?

- You wrote: "The only thing I need to debunk you is to point out the obvious fact that you haven't even begun making your case." My theory is that specialists at the "still-picture sublaboratory in the Pentagon" [opened in 1943] doctored the photo, your theory is that it was doctored twice, by sheer coincidence to boot; once by a owner of a Californian wood-mill [!] and earlier by someone at the NYT. Your *case* for this theory has been made in a series of increasingly frustrated comments on this thread. All of which is highly amusing, but you can't claim your *case* is any better developed than mine. "So yeah, your "theory" is still absurd, out-of-hand dismissable and that makes you a clown." Alas, the frustration is all yours, whilst I'm the one who' been entertained by your ravings; you're the one doing the clowning.

- You wrote: "Once again, the cropping doesn't mean that the image doesn't come from the negative. They are not obligated to do it on your terms. Nobody is." I will continue to make the factually correct assertion that any cropped print is not an authentic reproduction of the negative.

- You wrote: "You haven't provided any proof that the original photo has been manipulated in any way. All you've found are two demonstrably retouched photos in secondary sources. Which means exactly nothing." I have demonstrated that the "original" is manipulated to a higher standard than your have been content to settle on for your claims about the NYTM & MM versions. You're relying entirely on my photographs/scans of the NYTM, and mine or others photographs of the three editions of MM's book. Your crucial, supposed *missing* post-foot on the NYTM, isn't missing at all; it's just very hard to see in this small, 71-yr-old, cheaply printed magazine. Allow me to spoon-feed you evidence once again:http://fotos.fotoflexer.com/2afe4c0ec1df4a18a4b80eafe7ef1f1b.jpg

- You wrote: "There's nothing expertly about drawing a few grey rectangles. It's not rocket surgery." Mixing metaphors! It's may not be rocket science, or brain surgery, but back in the 1940s [long before Google Paint], painting items into photographs was considered a far more difficult skill than removing them. Read a book or two on the art of photographic manipulation.

You've completely failed in this endeavour, Sergey, and I can say without doubt that yours is the worst post ever made on this blog. You should've just ignored my revelations about this photo, as your colleagues opted to when they were asked to debunk my findings several years ago.

- No, you're just a shitty writer and thinker. No, the entire face should not be blurred because the movement was small enough and the blur effect was very weak, slightly visible only on the dark background. So we wouldn't expect a "blur" instead of face.It's still a simple fact that the motion blur marks *are* there. There's no getting around it.

- There's nothing painstaking about drawing a few grey rectangles, and we know that something was removed from the photo since the retoucher forgot to finish the bunk posts.

- Of course you weren't, so you just spouted BS as usual. Since we're clearly looking at two different retouched photos (with nothing but a grey smudge on the MM version), you have to deal with the fact that your imbecilic post was based on your inability to see the obvious. And - evolution? I always assumed both were retouched, I was just silly enough to take your word for the bunk posts appearing at the MM version. You simply cannot be trusted on anything. Lesson learned.

- Cropping still irrelevant despite your irrational insistence on the opposite. And no, you would still insist that the photo is fake, because showing an uncropped photo doesn't establish its authenticity.

- Again, all I need to point out is that you have produced exactly zero evidence for photo manipulation. As you have. That the two photos have been independently retouched is a fact: missing bunks, visible grey smudge.

On the other hand: evidence of photo manipulation by the agency in question for domestic propaganda purposes? Zero. Evidence that this particular photo has been manipulated? Zero.That's all that I need to point out. The burden of proof has been, is and will be on you. And you won't be ever able to meet it.

- Yes, a merely cropped image is an authentic image if it has not been manipulated and if the cropping doesn't alter its meaning. Your insistence on the contrary shows you're not a rational person.

- The bottom of the bunk post is still missing. Oops!

- And yet not only the photo has been demonstrably retouched in NYTM, you're still insisting on the imaginary forger skillfully painting the highly textured shadow, even though it was not in any sense necessary for the propaganda purposes of the time to make it look realistic.

You also fail to understand a basic point: just because some third party published a manipulated photo does not make the original one fake.

- You have shown yourself to be an clown making obviously absurd claims (your claim is, to repeat, dismissable out of hand; you should be thankful that I deigned to address your nonsense at all, if only to point and laugh). That you've made your false claim a featured post on your blog shows the scale of your delusion.

- Haha: "the blur effect was very weak, slightly visible only on the dark background", just not on his left wrist below the post, eh. So, you're claiming that it's only from his mid-forearm upwards is "motion blur" visible against the [lighter!] background of the post. Seriously, you're now getting utterly ridiculous: *highly-localised* motion blur theories!

- The foot of the post is there, but as it was shot in shadow and is barely 2mm wide in the NYTM's 71-year-old, cheaply printed version it is barely perceptible even when looking at it through a magnifying glass, which of course you, Mr. Googler, can't do.

- You didn't even mention MM's book in your post; you were unaware that it featured this photo on its cover until I mentioned it on this thread. So, please, less BS about *what you've always thought* about it.

- No, Sergey, whines are only present in your comments.

- Cropping is not irrelevant. Time you acted your age and accepted that fact.

- I've produced more evidence for photo manipulation that you have, you've just concocted a couple of theories based entirely on photographs posted on the internet by myself or others.

- We have no idea how or when MM came to be in possession of the photograph he eventually published on the cover of his book. Claiming that smudge makes it a "fact" that he doctored the photo is ridiculous in the extreme. It's a pity he's not 30yrs younger, with his penchant for litigation he'd probably instigate legal proceedings against this blog for defamation!

- The Toncman-present version was published on the front-page of newspapers all over the U.S in April-May 1945. A wall-sized version was printed and taken on a travelling exhibition on Nazi atrocities. There is considerable evidence that version was used for "domestic propaganda", thanks for bringing that up!

- "Your insistence on the contrary shows you're not a rational person." LOL, that's reminiscent of a Carolyn Yeager argument [recte: projected insult]. It's actually *because* of my rationality, that, as I previously said, an uncropped print would likely settle this debate. Your claim that such a print would be irrelevant merely proves you're suffering from the delusion you project at me.

- You'll note that a "highly textured shadow" also appears in the NYTM version, a shadow thrown by the post. So, you're really making me laugh with your display of doublethink: It would have been impossible for an expert at the Pentagon to create that shadow, but it was "hardly rocket surgery [sic]" for some bod at the NYT to paint one in!

- I'm well aware that a third party can manipulate a photo without it in any way discrediting the original image. Christ, what an obvious point to make with such fanfare!

I won't bother retaliating to your insults; you appear to be suffering already from my continued trouncing of your comedic theories and internet-restricted research prowess.

Get out of here. Your complete lack of knowledge on photo-manipulation has dug you a deep hole. These subjects are for experts and not dilettantes. I cannot believe that you think a cropped Image counts as "manipulated". If that were the case than almost every photo on the wall of any given home in the world would count as "manipulated".

I entered your blog and read the comment section.At least 5 comments there where racist slander like : " jews need to be kicked out of the UD , Jews are disgusting " etc . I did not see you argue with such statements nor remove them you simply ignored them.

Are you proud of the sort of crowd you are attracting in your blog ?

Out of 84 comments in your blog ONLY showed some sort of empathy to the suffering of the people in the picture. But he was quickly hushed by others trying to undermine the suffering by all sort of lame excuses ( e.g " there was hunger in all germany "- B.S the American POW's where not starved in that manner ) . That is what i mean by saying that is why it is denial not revision ...

What are we to conclude here ? : that deniers are some sort of psychopaths unable of human empathy ? Or is it that they are just unable to show empathy to Jews. One thing i did notice with many deniers - they never acknowledge and always try to undermine holocaust survivors suffering.

Maybe you would like to explain why is that ? And why did you ignore the racist comments in your blog ?

I've been there Nick, I don't need the online virtual tour of the In Black & White exhibition, because I saw it in person on 8 April 2014 during my two-day visit to Buchenwald on which I took 864 photos, many of this very exhibition, which is housed on the ground and first floors of the former Kammergebäude.

Here's my photo of the Toncman exhibit on which Sergey's highly-localised motion blur [which only affected the top-half of his forearm!] has been cropped, for understandable reasons:http://fotos.fotoflexer.com/7bdaee329f5f6fbe781f82d0d32e9008.jpg

Sergey should do the "virtual tour" though, in section 8 he'll see that famous photo of Washingtonians staring up at the 10ft tall print of the Toncman-present version which featured in the travelling propaganda exhibition 'Lest We Forget'.

btw, you forgot to explain what you think your google discovery is suppose to prove.

You completely dodged addressing the fact that someone has undeniably doctored this photo.

As for the comments on my blog. Well, I stopped allowing people to comment on my blog a few years ago. Comment threads often turn into off-topic muck throwing contests; the usual suspect, whose worthless *contributions* I always scroll-on-past, is doing it on this very thread.

You clearly don't know much about post-war Germany nor Buchenwald. Shortly after liberation by the Americans, the camp became NKVD Special Camp No. 2, in which thousands of people died of starvation.

The following is from a 1948 British report on Soviet concentration camps in Germany that I discovered in the British NA a few years ago:

"Buchenwald. An inmate of Buchenwald Camp during 1946 stated that persons who had been in the same camp under the Nazis complained that conditions were now worse. Some fat and meat had been issued by the Nazis, but under the Russians there was only bread and soup. It was estimated that the death rate was double that of the Nazi period. No correspondence was allowed."

- 'Concentration Camps and Maltreatment of Civilians in the Soviet Zone of Germany', report by the British Foreign Office Research Department, February 1948 http://winstonsmithministryoftruth.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/british-report-on-soviet-interrogations.html

If you ever take the trouble to visit Buchenwald, be sure to visit the exhibition on the Soviet tenure of this concentration camp, and pay your respects at the graves of the 7,000 people who were killed or died at Buchenwald when the camp was run by the Soviets; who, incidentally, weren't then being bombed back to the Stone Age by three superpowers.

Museum sign near one mass burial site:http://fotos.fotoflexer.com/ddb03c9c412d545326c958d6be3c564e.jpgThe graves are marked by these steel poles:http://fotos.fotoflexer.com/636d18dabe724c6e6b0e6b8c723fd9a7.jpg

Five minutes of googling - shock, horror - was all it took to find dozens of images from Buchenwald in 1945, taken by at least half a dozen photographers. The Signal Corps had at least three there, one taking colour photos. That's what the online exhibition underlines, and it even names the photographer who took 'that' picture. USHMM have 21 photos just of bunks and barracks interiors. Getty Images has a couple of anniversary exhibitions of Buchenwald liberation. pics. NARA display good-quality scans of the Signal Corps photos. Civilian photographers for press agencies and magazines took just as many iconic pictures as Signal Corps photographers in uniform; today we also can see photographs taken by liberated inmates that show the exact same scenes. That's what the one link summarised.

As you undoubtedly know, Buchenwald was also filmed after liberation - there are sequences in 'Nazi Concentration Camps'. And this was one of half a dozen big camps liberated by the western Allies, and many dozens of smaller sites with potentially shocking sights.

Clearly, there was no shortage of visual material to publicise in America. This undeniable context puts the fussing over alleged fakery of a single photo in the same category as the moon landing hoax brigade, JFK conspiracy buffs, 9/11 no-planers and the September Clues forum lunatics. Not because you are arguing that all photos from Buchenwald in 1945 depict a fake reality, but because it's completely insane to fixate on one picture when there were dozens of others that would do just as well, never mind still photos taken from the film material available at that time.

Your first blog underscores why you are completely insane on this issue. You discovered that the photo, described by NARA as taken on April 16 by the Signal Corps, was first published in the US press on April 29, 1945. The Los Angeles Times and New York Times both published it on that day, both crediting it to the Signal Corps. They both ran an accompanying story credited to Associated Press. The LA Times did not crop the picture and published it with the man on the right. The NYT cropped the picture drastically and placed it under a picture of corpses being moved. Over the next few days, you found four other newspapers publishing the uncropped picture with the man clearly visible. A whole week later, on the very bottom of p.42, practically buried away, the NYT then published a retouched photo without the man, without identifying its origin. But it had published the same photo heavily cropped a week before. Yet the May 6 1945 photo is supposedly crucial? Wut?

So now you appear to be in 'two Oswalds' territory, and the entire argument seems to have been reverse-engineered, retconned and run through Babelfish from Albanian to Zulu and back again, because it makes no sense whatsoever.

I am not an expert but doesn't the rabbit guy shoot his own leg with the picture from Mel Mermelstein book?The picture there displays an obvious smudge were the standing man should be. It is obviously edited, there is no doubt about it, there is nothing there, no standing man and no empty banks either.So it is quite clear we have 3 versions of the picture. 1)The official picture, displaying the standing skinny man. 2)The NYTM picture, displaying empty banks. 3)The Mel Mermelstein picture, displaying a hollow blank smudge.YET, if the original picture is the one from NYTM, why would Mel Mermelstein bother to smudge out some empty banks? It it obvious the part that was smudged out was the skinny standing man, therefore the official picture is indeed the original.

I've done some research today, reading a lot about this conspiracy around this picture.

I found this site which managed to replicate a photo with blurry lines such as the ones seen in the picture around the standing skinny man by using a camera and a moving model figure, negating the claim of the man being inserted into the picture.

http://www.ww2freak.com/el-barracon-56-de-buchenwald/

It is in Spanish though.

The blurry lines are therefore indeed result of the man slightly moving to the right.

Semi off=topic question: was there ever an attempt in this blog to refute the anti-Semetic wiki "Metapedia" and it's arguments about the Holocaust? It supposedly has a proof of forgery for every single document of argument that we use.http://en.metapedia.org/wiki/The_Holocaust

* forgot to add more relevant links in need of addressing:http://en.metapedia.org/wiki/Category:Alleged_Holocaust_documentshttp://en.metapedia.org/wiki/Category:Alleged_Holocaust_witnesseshttp://en.metapedia.org/wiki/Holocaust_material_evidencehttp://en.metapedia.org/wiki/Holocaust_documentary_evidencehttp://en.metapedia.org/wiki/Holocaust_testimonial_evidencehttp://en.metapedia.org/wiki/Holocaust_demographics

Gabi: what we have covered can be seen in the two sets of tags on the right. Please use them or use the search function.

We have generally concentrated on the published deniers like Mattogno. Metapedia tends to cite these authors and references the same things we discuss. They have a page on Aktion 1005 that cites Mattogno and Graf - we have been running a series of blog posts on Mattogno's errors regarding 1005. The same thing goes for forum deniers, bloggers and others who repeat arguments already found in published 'revisionist' literature. More rarely we find claims made by bloggers, forum deniers and so on that are not really pushed by the likes of Mattogno, such as the subject of this blog post, or things like tattoo denial, and so there are a number of posts about those things.

A lot of your questions would, as mentioned before, be more easily answered on a forum, e.g. Skeptics Society Forum or the International Skeptics Forum. There you can find helpful people including people who post comments here. The discussions on such forums are often visible in google as well, just as you might notice older discussions on, say, Axis History Forum, on various searches.

We do not want our comments threads going constantly off-topic because either a denier or a non-denier brings up some subject not being discussed in the blog post.

Nick - I just want to say that if I'm asking something, you can assume I've already searched for it and didn't find what I'm looking for. For example, a few weeks ago I really wanted to ask you about Friedrich Berg's "cherry bright red" argument, but than I searched it and found relevant things that you guys have written on the subjact.But don't worry, you won't see to much nagging from me in the near future, for two reasons:1) I respect you request and the rules of your blog2) I'm beginning my national service in a few days, so I won't have time for this anyway :)

... but it must be said: I would rather not ask things on the SSF because it has both anti-deneirs and deniers alike. I would rsther ask these questions on a 100% friendly territory.

So let's imagine that I have a question, and even though you have a post on the subjact, it does answer the question specificlly. Would it be okay to comment on said post (even if it's very old) and expect a reply?

For example, you have maby posts about mattogno, and posts where you mention Richard Green of the anti-leuchter report dine by the Krakow institute. But I have't seen you addressing mattognos claim that Green allegedly adniting that revisionists were right and that Krakow institute fabricated evidence.

- All this squawking ignores the fact that the blur is still there, around the ear and the neck.

- The foot of the post is clearly not there. The rest of the post is visible just fine. The bottom part should be visible just as the upper part is - same as with the other posts.

- Since I was reacting to your post I obviously knew about MM's cover since you mentioned it. So it's more of your delusional nonsense. I didn't mention it because it's so clearly irrelevant (as I continued to point out in the comments).

- Actually no, the only whines are yours.

- Cropping still irrelevant despite the whines. Your merely repeating the claim does not make it true.

- You haven't produced any evidence that the original photo has been manipulated.

- That MM's photo has been manipulated is visible to the naked eye, even more so than with the NYTM photo (there one can at least miss the missing post feet; missing the crude grey smudge is hard). BTW, I don't know why you continue to claim that Mermelstein doctored the photo. Do you have any evidence that he made the cover himself rather than hired someone to produce the cover, as is much more usual?

- As pointed out, your whole thesis is so absurd, evidence-free and contrary to Occam's razor from the start that you cannot be rational in any useful sense.

- There's a huge difference between painting in some plain grey rectangles and drawing a hi-res, realistic shadow.

- Thanks for acknowledging this point. Too bad it means you haven't proven anything about the original and are ridiculous.

I'm sorry Sergey, but what is in fact the difference between asking a question and "plz debunk debunk this nonsense for me"? I mean, isn't the entire point of anti-denial IS to debunk nonsense?I get that for you guys, who have much more knowledge and education, as well as sheer expirience in dealing with holocaust deniers, requesting a debunk of certain things might indeed seem silly to you. All I ask for is to learn and educate myself, and the only way to do so, is, well, to find ways to debunk denier nonsense. Sometimes I manage to do this by myself (if I asked about ALL issues that had with the subject, there would be HUNDREDES of comments in each of your last posts), and sometimes I don't - therefor I try to get help from the finest anti-denial source online, which is you guys.I am, off course, not forcing you into anything. This is your blog and your time, you can do whatever you want. All I'm saying that my questions surely don't from a bad place, and they are defiently not the results of laziness - I only ask things that I haven't managed to figure out of my own.

Gabi: "... but it must be said: I would rather not ask things on the SSF because it has both anti-deneirs and deniers alike. I would rsther ask these questions on a 100% friendly territory."

Well, we have deniers commenting here, too, so not even this blog's below the line comments are 100% friendly territory.

Of the various forums I think the International Skeptics Forum is the "friendliest", since there are only a few deniers who post there occasionally, whereas Skeptics Society Forum is currently overrun by some idiot YouTube deniers (Jim Rizoli and Diane King) and is a toxic environment.

At ISF, here is a single big thread for Holocaust denial, currently the end is herehttp://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?t=279600&page=9It's actually quite a good set-up, having a single big thread, since one problem with entire forums like at SSF is a proliferation of threads started by morons.

I am a member at ISF and am happy to answer questions there; other ISF members are also knowledgeable and the environment is very good, with strict rules against insults and personal attacks. Just be clear about your standpoint, maybe say you've been posting comments here, you know how easy it is to misunderstand people on the internet and think they're coming from a different perspective or have a hidden agenda.

"So let's imagine that I have a question, and even though you have a post on the subjact, it does answer the question specificlly. Would it be okay to comment on said post (even if it's very old) and expect a reply?"

We see every comment made on a post older than 2 weeks, for moderation purposes, in order to stop spammers leaving "barnacles" on older posts.

However it would be really great if you could post such questions elsewhere on a forum like ISF, since it would publicise the blog and there would be more readers, whereas a comment on an older post might only be read by you and the blog member replying, until days or weeks later, as not every older post is going to be read on a daily basis. You can link back to the HC post and it helps us in lots of ways.

Also because some of your questions could be answered by other people rather than us; the question about Leuchter will soon be topical because of the forthcoming film 'Denial', about the Irving-Lipstadt trial, and the reports etc from that case are online; some of the people at ISF can be very diligent in checking things out (they are the premiere 9/11 conspiracy theory debunking forum on the internet).

Personally, I would much rather answer a question on a forum where I can embed links more easily - yes, I could learn to do that here, but the Blogger comments software is pretty awful.

You see, you gave the irving trial and its documents as a source, but fon't seem to address the fact that deniers have very clear opinions on them. I actually came here after to much debates with deniers on the "Denial" trailer on youtube. As I said, refutations for denier arguments are not hard to find. BUMut in most csses, deniers have counter arguments for THESE ready in their pockets.Everybody knowd for example that Nizkor answered Zundels 66 Questions. But than I see that Zundel answered them back. Ive never seen an attempt to answer back to him yet again. Theres no debunking-of-debunking-of-debunking.

1. You wrote: "Semi off=topic question: was there ever an attempt in this blog to refute the anti-Semetic wiki "Metapedia" and it's arguments about the Holocaust? It supposedly has a proof of forgery for every single document of argument that we use."

That's asking us to debunk the whole metapedia.

2. Why don't *you* apply your brain power to the refutations of the refutations? You don't have to always depend on a nanny. If we're talking about Zündel, he's a particularly dumb denier. I understand how a newbie could be stumped by his initial 66QA, but once you get his m.o., what's the problem? He lies or otherwise distorts each step of the way.

Example: http://www.zundelsite.org/archive/debate/003_jam.html

"Another well-known source on this topic is Martin Broszat's letter dismissed by Nizkor as irrelevant. As early as 1960, the director of the German Institute for Contemporary History admitted there were no gas chambers. He wrote to the German newspaper Die Zeit: "Neither in Dachau nor in Bergen Belsen nor in Buchenwald were Jews or other prisoners gassed." It does not follow from this statement, to use a crass example, that to say ". . . there were no murders in Boston, Chicago and New York" implies or proves that there were murders in San Francisco. It is a silly argument! "

Zündel outright *lies* - Broszat did not claim that there were no gas chambers. He only claimed that there were no gas chambers in certain camps. In case of Dachau he might even have been too quick with his conclusion. And if Zündel lies about such a simple thing, even while citing Broszat, why would he have credibility on anything else?

So if you really want to debate deniers, here's a home task for you: take Zündel's response and go through his arguments step by step. Then go a second time through the arguments that you couldn't answer before. Third time. Google, google, read, read. Post results in the form of an article here in the comments. And then we will discuss the issues that you had a problem dealing with.

Zündel was the one who famously claimed that his trial was the first one in which witnesses were cross examined. Just read Roberto's excellent articles on the German legal system and you'll see Zundel and his supporters for the frauds they are.

I'll give yet another example in regards to you hometask.The Green report and the Krakow report are two really popular ways to refute deniers. But than Mattogno stpes in and says that "Markiewicz was found to have fabricated his results" and that Green "was forced to admit that Revisionists were right after all". Both statement come from an online description of one of IHRs "holocaust handbooks", and the rest of the page is only an online-order page where you can by his masterpiece. Since it is not something I'm ever planning to do, I admit that the "go through the arguments step by step" is a tricky task. But still, I've ventured the internet in order to find out the origin of these statement. In my personal experience, I've learned that no matter how ridicolous a denier "meme" sounds, it usually has an origin ("It was real in my mind" and "gassed six million times"). Wasn't able to find it for hours of research. I sincerly have no idea where does his ideas come from, but surely he has to have SOME excuses. The "Google, google, read, read" therfore, is also, a bit hard to perform.

So you see? There's no need to assume that I'm coming for the nanny's help as my first step. It is always a last resort.

Gabi: "But than Mattogno stpes in and says that "Markiewicz was found to have fabricated his results" and that Green "was forced to admit that Revisionists were right after all". Both statement come from an online description of one of IHRs "holocaust handbooks"

This is actually Germar Rudolf because Mattogno doesn't address this stuff *at all*.

Rudolf and Mattogno are the two authors of 'Auschwitz Lies', which compiles many older articles from the early 2000s but has been rereleased in a '3rd slightly revised edition'. And like most of the 'Holocaust Handbooks', you can download it for free online, and see for yourself if you wish.http://holocausthandbooks.com/dl/18-al.pdf

The marketing rhetoric they put in the blurbs, which is what you are quoting, does not get proven by the texts. Markiewicz et al did not 'fabricate' his results at all, the issue is one of control and comparison and interpretation. Naturally Rudolf wants to have 'the last word' and declare victory, but the entire argument originally dates back now 24 to 28 years, to 1988-1992, and there has been a resounding 'meh' of indifference from professional chemists.

If the chemistry argument is so convincing, why doesn't the undisputed premiere revisionist, Carlo Mattogno, use it?

You've said a few times you wanted debunking of the debunking of the debunking - that's debate, and in 2005, some of the bloggers here (Sergey, Hans, Roberto) along with others debated some revisionists, including Robert Countess who was a published denier, about Auschwitz. They went three rounds. The debate is preserved at the current RODOH forum, you can read the 'Veritas' team (anti-denier) statements and they quote everything said in the denier team statementshttps://rodoh.info/forum/viewforum.php?f=18It's a very informative debate, and it will show you people responding to debunkings of debunkings. It also discusses the chemistry and ventilation issues.

The 'chemistry' argument has not progressed since the early 2000s; don't be fooled by the 'slightly revised editions' of the Leuchter report or Rudolf report you might see online. By the time you finish your national service, the Leuchter report will be thirty years old.

It seems as though the chemistry arguemtns, despite being old and mostly irrelevant, are still in use to this day. Hargis still describes Rudolf as a "master chemist", and one out of three holocaust deniers on youtube or twitter would use the old Prussian Blue/Delousing chambers argument. So basically, all wannabe-revisionists didn't get the memo?

You said you were troubled by the denier arguments. The best therapy for that is still taking one substantial piece of denier babble and working through it step by step. That's also a learning process. 10-15 years ago I dealt with some of Mattogno's earlier work in the way that I now understand was quite naive, in terms of how historians work with witness testimonies (it was his "First gassing" article and I tried to make all the testimonies fit each other - and even succeeded in some sense, but that's not how history works anyway). Now I know better, but that was still a good first step.

Debating deniers on youtube comments is an on-and-off thing, try to structurize your experiences/knowledge. Maybe start a blog specifically for working through the denier stuff. And who knows, maybe we'll help in the comments on your blog ;)

It would certainly be more worth your (and our) while than asking questions in the comments here, that will go mostly unread by the outside world...

PS: as for Markiewicz et al, a brief search shows that the claim you cite is not from Mattogno but again from Rudolf. I'm not a chemist, but from all that I have read on the topic, I understand that argument as follows: Green et al. say that it would not have made sense to analyze the Prussian blue staining since we already know that it was probably a result of the HCN activity (Markiewicz et al. might have made other assumptions, like wall coating, but in the end this doesn't change anything). Whereas Rudolf et al. complain that Markiewicz et al. did not test the Prussian blue stains and on this basis accuse M. et al. of fraud. Except Green's argument makes more sense: you should compare apples with other apples, not with oranges. I.e. if you're comparing the levels of HCN in structures once exposed to it, you should compare unstained areas with unstained areas and stained areas with stained areas (or alternatively, unstained v. stained using the method that excludes the cyanide that is bound as Prussian blue). Doing otherwise makes no sense whatsoever. The *only* issue worth discussing (and it has been discussed) is what conditions led to the disparity in the Prussian blue formation in different chambers. But that's separate entirely from the stupid accusations of fraud.

And no, Green hasn't "admitted" anything more than the facts dictate. Green's last word is at http://phdn.org/archives/holocaust-history.org/irving-david/rudolf/affweb.pdf

Deniers like to claim that this or that expert "admitted" something. Like Rudolf's article in Au. Lies, p. 86 says that Green "finally" had to admit that Iron Blue could be formed by HCN - duh, had he ever denied it?

"You said you were troubled by the denier arguments. The best therapy for that is still taking one substantial piece of denier babble and working through it step by step."

The problem is, I am admitibally SCARED of the possibillity that a denier claim or argument would actually make sense to me. I don't want to be in this place. That's why when there is no choice, I tend to seek the help of people like you whom I know can't be fazed or troubled by ANY denier claim anymore.

I can't help you with your fear, but since you have it, the only way to overcome that I know of is outlined above. There's no reason to "hide" from it. If it makes sense to you, well, that's just the way it is. Taking the ostrich approach doesn't seem like an option.

I've been in a position of admitting that a denier argument at least partially makes more sense than that of the mainstream historians' (e.g. http://holocaustcontroversies.blogspot.com/2007/08/correction-corner-4-auschwitz-museum.html and http://holocaustcontroversies.blogspot.com/2006/04/correction-corner-2-himmlers-visit-to.html ), and I've been in a position where I couldn't initially find a good response, so I suspended judgment for a while (only to find a good response later). It need not be an "either/or" approach. Confront the "fear" rather than hiding from it.

I still don't understand what is so outragous in your eyes when a newbie who doesn't know much tries to get help from experts, in a case where he failed to solve something by himself. Things that might take me months of even years to analyne might be easily solved by others in the matter of seconds ["Counter Arguemt 2" in this page, for example http://codoh.com/library/document/657/].

Gabi: "I still don't understand what is so outragous in your eyes when a newbie who doesn't know much tries to get help from experts, in a case where he failed to solve something by himself. Things that might take me months of even years to analyne might be easily solved by others in the matter of seconds."

There's nothing "outrageous" about asking questions. I answered numerous questions from you on the other thread, then it went to moderation, and continued to answer questions. Then you asked more on this thread, and I've answered some parts of those as well.

I suggested that you join a forum so the discussion could become easier and more comfortable for me.

By now, you could easily have worked out how to email me at my university email address (I am at the University of Exeter), and you might have sent me a series of emails with questions. And I would answer them. Let's say you emailed me with a query every few months - no problem. If you emailed me with 5 queries in one day then this might be too much.

We were all newbies once, and we learned by asking questions but also by doing our own reading, which you are doing; good students ask a tutor questions like you are doing on specific points they don't understand based on their reading. I can see how you had some confusions and some were clarified, some haven't been fully answered yet.

I would imagine if you go on to university no matter what degree you took, you would do this - I would absolutely encourage it!